Religion makes sense 151 upvotes | April 24, 2014 | by Cyralea ------------------------- If you think I'm about to preach and try to convert, rest assured, I'm not. I'm an ardent atheist, and I always will be. No, what I want to delve into is the practices that are the core of the largest modern religions, Christianity and Islam. For most progressives, religious traditions are laughably outdated at best, tyrannically controlling at worst. I admit I used to think this. What TRP has done is revealed the _why_ as to how they came to be, and why they endured as long as they did. What I, and certainly more intelligent men before me, now understand is that successful societies don't grow organically. Mother nature doesn't lend itself to the success of all humans. It favours those with the best genetics, discarding the weak. Successful societies allow more people to thrive by controlling the worst behaviours in humans, and by favouring the middle at the expense of the top. Allowing betas a chance at marriage and procreation prevents them from becoming frustrated, angry, and most importantly _dangerous_. It allows them to function to the greater good of society by providing tax income to be spent on others, as well as become support figures for the next generation. There are no healthy societies with angry frustrated males. So how does one do this? The only truly effective way is thought control, and what better way than to instill the values from birth? Religion does fantastically in this regard, and has been used as such for millennia. Preventing women from becoming sluts ensures that the sex isn't sequestered to the top 20% of males. Denying contraception means that women have to be careful about sleeping around, same with forcing women to bear children by denying abortion. Women that are forced to cover up serves the dual purpose of making it harder for them to flirt, as well as preventing temptation from other men. Every single one of these religious doctrines makes sense as far as the cohesion of societies are concerned. Progressive attitudes will undo all of this, and lead to the fall of Rome. I don't believe in religion, but I believe in what religion stands for. I'd be curious to see what other atheists make of this. ------------------------- Archived from https://theredarchive.com/post/14542